The Violet Carlyle Mysteries Boxset 1

by Beth Byers

  She sighed into the mirror glancing over her familiar face with little emotion. She neither liked nor disliked her face. She knew her hair was pretty enough though it tended towards a frizziness she’d never learned to anticipate or tame. The color was a decent medium brown with corresponding medium brown eyes. Her skin was clear of blemishes, for which she was grateful, though she despised the freckles that sprinkled over her nose and cheeks. Her dress rose to her collar, but her freckles continued down her arms and over her chest. At least her lips were perfectly adequate, neither thin nor full, but nothing to cause a second glance. Like all of her, she thought, there was nothing to cause a second glance.

  Despite her lackluster looks, she didn’t despise her face. She rather liked herself. Unlike many she knew, the inside of her head was not a terrible place to be. She had no major regrets and enjoyed her own humor well enough even if she rarely bothered to share her thoughts with others.

  Georgette supposed if she had been blessed with liveliness, she might be rather pretty, but she knew herself well. She was quiet. Both in her persona and voice, and she was easily ignored. It had never been something that she bemoaned. She was who she was and though very few knew her well, those who knew her liked her. Those who knew her well—the very few who could claim such a status—liked her very well.

  On a morning when Georgie was not worrying over her bank account, she could be counted on entering the dining room at 9:00 a.m. On that morning, however, she was rather late. She had considered goats again as she brushed her teeth—no one else in Bard’s Crook kept goats though there were several who kept cows. Those bedamned goats kept coming back to her mind, but she’d rather sell everything she owned and throw herself on the mercy of the city than keep goats. She had considered trying to sew clothing while she’d pulled on her stockings and slipped her shoes on her feet. She had considered whether she might make hats when she’d brushed her hair, and she had wondered if she might take a lodger as she’d straightened her dress and exited her bedroom.

  All of her options were rejected before she reached the base of her stairs, and she entered the dining room with an edge of desperation. As she took her seat at the head of the table and added a very small amount of sugar to her weak tea, her attention was caught by the most unexpected of sights. A letter to the left of her plate. Georgette lifted it with shaking hands and read the return address. Aaron & Luther Publishing. She gasped and then slowly blew out the air.

  “Be brave, dear girl,” she whispered, as she cut open the envelope. “If they say no, you can always send your book to Anderson Books. Hope is not gone. Not yet.”

  She pulled the single sheet of paper out and wondered if it was a good sign or a bad sign that they had not returned her book. Slowly, carefully, she unfolded the letter, her tea and toast entirely abandoned as she read the contents.

  Moments later, the letter fluttered down to her plate and she sipped her scalding hot tea and didn’t notice the burn.

  “Is all well, Miss Georgie?” The maid was standing in the doorway. Her wrinkled face was fixated on her girl with the same tense anticipation that had Georgette reading her letter over and over while it lay open on her plate. Those dark eyes were fixated on Georgette’s face with careful concern.

  “I need cream, Eunice.” Georgette nodded to her maid. “We’re saved. They want Chronicles. My goodness, my dear, wonderful woman, see to the cream and let’s stop making such weak tea until we discover the details of the fiscal benefits.”

  Eunice had to have been as relieved as Georgette, but the maid simply nodded stalwartly and came back into the dining room a few minutes later with a fresh pot of strong tea, a full bowl of sugar, and the cream that had been intended for supper. It was still the cheapest tea that was sold in Bard’s Crook, but it was black and strong and tasted rather like nirvana on her tongue when Georgette drank it down.

  “I’ll go up to London tomorrow. He wants to see me in the afternoon, but he states very clearly he wants the book. We’re saved.”

  “Don’t count your chickens before they hatch, Miss Georgie.”

  “By Jove, we aren’t just saved from a lack of cream, Eunice. We’re saved from goats! We’re saved my dear. Have a seat and enjoy a cuppa yourself.”

  Eunice clucked and returned to the kitchen instead. They might be saved, but the drawing room still needed to be done, dinner still needed to be started, and the laundry and mending were waiting for no woman.

  When Miss Marsh made her way into London the following day, she was wearing her old cloche, which was quite dingy but the best she had, a coat that was worn at the cuffs and the hem, and shoes that were just starting to have a hole worn into the bottom. Perhaps, she thought, there would even be enough to re-sole her shoes.

  On the train into London from Bard’s Crook, only Mr. Thornton was taking the train from the village. When he inquired after her business, she quite shocked herself when she made up a story about meeting an old Scottish school chum for tea. Mr. Thornton admitted he intended to meet with his lawyer. He was rather notorious in Bard’s Crook for changing his will as often as the wind changed direction. An event he always announced with an air of doom and a frantic waggling of his eyebrows.

  Mr. Thornton had married a woman from the factories who refused to acknowledge her past, and together they had three children. Those children—now adults—included two rebellious sons and one clinging daughter. He also had quite a slew of righteous nephews who deserved the acclaim they received. Whenever his wife bullied him too hard or his sons rebelled too overtly, the will altered in favor of the righteous nephews until such time as an appropriate repentance could be made.

  Georgie had long since taken to watching the flip-flopping of the will with a delighted air. As far as she could tell, no one but herself enjoyed the changing of his will, but enjoying things that others didn’t seem to notice had long been her fate.

  The fortunate news of the inheritance situation was that Mr. Thornton’s nephews were unaware of the changing of their fortunes. The clinging daughter’s fortune was set in stone. She never rebelled and thus never had her fortunes reversed, but she clung rather too fiercely to be a favored inheritor.

  Mr. Thornton handed Miss Marsh down from the train, offered to share a black cab, and then left her without regret when she made a weak excuse. Miss Marsh selected her own black cab, cutting into her ready money dreadfully, and hoped that whatever occurred today would restore her cash in hand.

  CHARLES AARON

  “Mr. Aaron,” Schmidt said, “your afternoon appointment has arrived.”

  “Wonderful,” Charles replied. “Send him in with tea, will you Schmidtty?”

  “Her, sir.”

  “Her? Isn’t my appointment with an author?” Charles felt a flash of irritation. He was very much looking forward to meeting the author of The Chronicles of Harper’s Bend. He had, in fact, read the book twice more since that first time.

  Schmidt’s lips twitched when he said, “It seems the author is a Miss Marsh.”

  Charles thought over the book and realized that of course Mr. Jones was a Miss Marsh. Who but a woman would realize the fierce shame of bribing one’s children with candies to behave for church? Charles could almost hear the tirade of his grandmother about the lack of mothering skills in the upcoming generations.

  “Well, send her in, and tea as well.” Charles rubbed his hands together in glee. He did adore meeting new writers. They were never what you expected, but they all had one thing in common. Behind their dull or beautiful faces, behind their polite smiles and small talk, there were whole worlds. Characters with secrets that only the writer knew. Unnecessary histories that were cut viciously from the story and hidden away only to be known by the author.

  Charles rather enjoyed asking the writers random questions about their characters’ secret histories. Tell me, author, Charles would say, as they shared a cup of tea or a pipe, what does so-and-so do on Christmas morning? Or what is his/her favorite color? He lov
ed when they answered readily, knowing that of course so-and-so woke early on Christmas morning, opened presents and had a rather spectacular full English only to sleep it off on the Chesterfield near the fire.

  He loved it when they described what they ate down to the nearest detail as though the character’s traditional breakfast had been made since time immemorial rather than born with a pen and hidden behind the gaze of the person with whom Charles was sharing an hour or two.

  Charles had long since become inured to the varying attitudes of authors. Thomas Spencer, who had given Charles a rather terrible headache that had been cured by Miss Marsh’s delightful book, wore dandified clothes and had an arrogant air. Spencer felt the cleverness of his books justified his rudeness.

  On the other hand, an even more brilliant writer, Henry Moore, was a little man with a large stomach. He kept a half-dozen cats, spoiled his children terribly, and was utterly devoted to his wife. In a gathering of authors, Moore would be the most successful and the cleverest by far but be overshadowed by every other writer in attendance.

  Miss Marsh, Charles saw, fell into the ‘Moore’ category. She seemed as timid as a newborn rabbit as she edged into his office. Her gaze flit about, taking in the stack of manuscripts, the shelf of books he’d published over the course of his career, the windows that looked onto a dingy alleyway, and the large wooden desk.

  She was, he thought, a dowdy little thing. Her eyes were nice enough, but they barely met his own, and she didn’t seem to know quite what to say. Her freckles seemed to be rather spectacular—if one liked freckles—but it was hard to anything with her timid movements. Especially with her face barely meeting his own. That was all right, he thought, he’d done this many times, and she was very new to the selling of a book and the signing of contracts.

  “Hello,” he said rather cheerily, hoping that his tone would set her at ease.

  She glanced up at him and then back down, her gaze darting around his office again. Mr. Aaron wondered just what she was seeing amidst all of his things. He wouldn’t be surprised to find she was noting things that the average fellow would overlook.

  “Would you like tea?”

  Miss Marsh nodded, and he poured her a cup to which she added a hefty amount of cream and sugar. He grinned at the sight of her milky tea and then leaned back as she slowly spun her teacup on the saucer.

  “Why Joseph Jones? Why a pen name at all?”

  Miss Marsh blinked rather rapidly and then admitted, “Well…” Her gaze darted to the side, and she said, “I was rather inspired by my neighbors, but I would prefer to avoid their gossip as well. Can you imagine?” A cheeky grin crossed her face for a moment, and he was entranced. “If they discovered that Antoinette Moore wrote a book?”

  “Is that you?”

  “Pieces of her,” she admitted, and he frowned. The quiet woman in front of him certainly had the mannerisms of the character, but he couldn’t quite see Miss Moore writing a book and sending it off. She was such an innocuous, almost unnecessary character in the book.

  Was Miss Marsh was a literary portraitist? He grinned at the idea and wanted nothing more than to visit Harper’s Bend or wherever it was that this realistic portrayal existed in real life. What he would give to have an afternoon tea with the likes of Mrs. Morton and her ilk.

  Mr. Aaron glanced over Miss Marsh. Her old cloche and worn coat were not lost on him, and he supposed if he’d met her anywhere else he’d never have looked at her twice. Having read her book, however, he suddenly felt as though she were far more charming than she’d otherwise have been.

  Her gaze, with ordinary medium brown eyes, seemed to have untold depths, and her freckles seemed to be an outward indicator of a woman who could look at her village and turn it into a witty caricature, acting as a warning that this was a woman who said nothing and noticed everything.

  He grinned at her. “I read your book, and I liked it.”

  Her eyes flashed and a bright grin crossed her face, and he realized she was a little prettier than he’d noticed. It was that shocked delight on her face that made him add, “I like it quite well indeed.”

  Miss Marsh clasped her hands tightly together, and Mr. Aaron did not miss how her grip camouflaged the trembling of her hands.

  “Tell me about it,” he said kindly. “Why did you write it? This is a portrait of your neighbors?”

  It was the kindness that got Miss Marsh to open up, and then she couldn’t seem to stem the tide of her thoughts; they sped out. “Well, it was my dividends you see. They’ve quite dried up. I was struggling before, but they’d always come in and then they didn’t, and I was quite—” Miss Marsh trailed off and Mr. Aaron could imagine the situation all too easily. “at my wit’s end. Only then I thought of Louisa May Alcott and the other lady writers, and I thought I might as well try as not.”

  The world was struggling and Miss Marsh, who may have escaped the early failing of things, had eventually succumbed as so many had. As she said, her dividends had dried up. He could imagine her lying awake worried and uncertain or perhaps pacing her home. There was something so unpretentious about her revelation that Mr. Aaron was even more charmed. She’d come to the end of things, and she’d turned that worry into the most charming of stories. Not just a charming story, but one filled with heart and delight in the little things. He liked her all the better for it.